May the muffins be forever in your favour."The Washouts" Review: Lightning Dust's Return and the Biggest Trial for Scootaloo's & Rainbow Dash's Sistership · 1:57am Sep 9th, 2018
Before I have seen this episode, I accidentally received a spoiler for it..... But even though I usually hate getting spoilered, I did not mind this one, because it made me very excited for it.....
After a very, very, very long time, we see the return of.....
LIGHTNING DUST!
This is something that happened so unexpectedly. We haven't seen Lightning Dust since "Wonderbolts Academy" in Season 3! These are almost five whole seasons we haven't seen her, or, almost five years and nine months! For nearly five years and nine months we haven't seen her and now, she suddenly returned into the show! This might be the most unexpected thing that My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic ever did, bringing a pony back into the show after so many years and seasons!
It reminds me on Zipporwhill's unexpected return in Season 7, but this is even much, much bigger than her return! I am completely baffled and amazed this happened!
What makes this more interesting, is the fact that Lightning Dust hasn't changed even one little bit. It is now about three years ago that she got kicked out of the Wonderbolts for being reckless and risking other ponies' lives, but instead of learning something from that experience, she has founded her own team of stunt ponies and continues to endanger herself and other ponies.
More than that, she even prides herself on it that they "ignore everything the Wonderbolts ever taught them about safety". Instead of learning from what she did wrong, she has become even more extreme and now fully embraces her recklessness.
This is a quite dangerous development she went through there and it makes her prone to create harm for other ponies once again, as the episode shows later on.....
What is even more important to me than Lightning Dust's return, though, are the roles of Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash in this episode. We rarely get an episode with them in the focus together, but now, it finally happened again! And not only did we get an episode centered around them, this is also the first, proper Scootaloo & Rainbow Dash episode ever since "Sleepless in Ponyville", which is also a Season 3 episode, a coincidence that I love!
The only two episodes that came close to being a full Scootaloo & Rainbow Dash episode since then are "Brotherhooves Social" in Season 5 and "Parental Glideance" last season, but neither of these got there completely because they didn't truly focus on them (alone). But "The Washouts" finally does and it does so in such a fantastic and deep way!
When Rainbow Dash explained to Lightning Dust that the Wonderbolts only want to find the best flyers, Scootaloo felt reminded on it that she is unable to fly and that she can't become a Wonderbolt because of that. This hurt her and in this vulnerable state, she took Rainbow Dash's words as her saying that a pegasus can only be great if it can fly.
And when Lightning Dust said that she believes that everypony can be the best, flying or not, she saw her chance for greatness and developed the desire to join the Washouts, to make something of her even without joining the Wonderbolts.
But when Rainbow Dash tried to stop her and basically forbad her to join the Washouts because what they do is dangerous and she was worried for her safety, she started thinking that Rainbow Dash doesn't even want her to become great or to become as awesome as her. Which got reinforced in her even more when Rainbow Dash exposed her to this peptalk by Spitfire and when she tried to convince her that what the Washouts do is too dangerous for her after she joined them.
It even came this far that she told Rainbow Dash that she doesn't have to be her just because she looks up to her and that she will never be the best or a Wonderbolt because she can't fly and that she, perhaps for the first time ever, admitted to be disabled and flightless with that. This is a tragic growth Scootaloo showed there and one of the most dramatic interactions we've seen between her and Rainbow Dash.
Of course, things didn't continue in a good way from that moment on. Lightning Dust wanted Scootaloo to jump with her scooter over twenty-two burning wagons while it is powered by several liquid-fueled rockets and despite Scootaloo's hesitation when she realized that this isn't a good idea, she coerced her into doing it.
It was only when Lightning Dust showed fully that she is still the same reckless mare who endangers others for her own gain and after Rainbow Dash saved Scootaloo when the stunt went wrong, that Scootaloo realized Lightning Dust isn't a good role model for her, followed by Rainbow Dash apologizing to her for making her feel like she will never be as awesome as her. Which all culminated in Rainbow Dash founding a fanclub for Scootaloo, to make it up to her how she made her feel.
This episode isn't exactly the type of Scootaloo & Rainbow Dash episode I imagine and hope to see, but nonetheless, seeing them almost getting torn apart as sisters and overcoming this obstacle and growing closer from it, this is one of the most wonderful things I have ever seen in My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. It's moments like these why Scootaloo & Rainbow Dash episodes belong to the best episodes of the show. <3
And with all of this, it is also one of the most heartwrenching episodes. It is one of these episodes that grimly remind you on it that Scootaloo actually has a very hard life. All the time we see her acting happy and tough, but moments like the ones in this episode or in "Flight to the Finish" or "The Fault in our Cutie Marks" show that, behind that tough exterior, Scootaloo actually griefs a lot over it that she is unable to fly. To make this even more sad, this episode also confirmed something that was long since theorized already; that Scootaloo does not just admire the Wonderbolts, but also dreams of joining them, a dream she can never fulfill, no matter how much she wants it.
Scootaloo is carrying a lot of baggage with her, and the fact that her parents are probably complete workaholics who don't care about her at all and who don't show her that she is appreciated doesn't make life easier for her. Which makes it all the more admirable that Scootaloo still manages to smile and to be happy. She is best pony for a reason.
Something similar goes for Rainbow Dash. At first, it looked like the only reason why she was concerned about Scootaloo joining the Washouts was because she feared that Scootaloo wouldn't look up to her and not admire her anymore. But as we learned later, her biggest concern was that Scootaloo gets hurt or worse.
This is a great example for it how much Rainbow Dash has grown the last years and since the times of Season 1. She now cares much less about her ego and much more about the well-being of the ponies who are close to her.
Coming back to Lightning Dust, I am trying to figure out if everything that happened wasn't just a coincidence, but actually a plan by her to get revenge on Rainbow Dash. When she said that being kicked from the Wonderbolts was the best thing that ever happened to her, she implied that she isn't mad at Rainbow Dash anymore. But her reactions showed that she still is, so, does this mean she was just pretending to not be mad anymore?
It could have all been just a coincidence, but that she concealed that she is still mad at Rainbow Dash is suspicious and it probably wouldn't have been hard for her to find out that Scootaloo can't fly and what bond exists between her and Rainbow Dash, so that she can try to get under Rainbow Dash's skin by riling up Scootaloo against her and by making her join her team.
If this was all a revenge plan by Lightning Dust, then she enacted it very subtly, and it's definitely possible that the course of the events was planned by her.
Speaking about revenge plans, I wonder if Lightning Dust has plans with the Washouts. Could she be planning to rival the Wonderbolts and to get them out of business as a revenge on Spitfire for kicking her out? Right now, it doesn't look like these are her intentions, but so far, the Washouts only consist of three members, which is not enough to try that, so maybe she is waiting until their numbers are bigger..... If she is indeed planning this, then what Big Jim said during Season 5 about Anti-Wonderbolts will become true.
I am excited for the future of the Washouts.
- Lastly, to make this episode perfect, it also has some smaller, interesting things in it. The best one of them are Pinkie Pie's "Scootaloo's Scooter" cupcakes! I am so amazed by them that I need them and I have spontaneously decided to make them myself for next month's Three Year Cutie Mark Anniversary of Applebloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle! :D
- It was also great to see the Rainbow Dash Fanclub by Scootaloo again and I'm happy that it still exists! Only the number of members seems to have become smaller, if I remember correctly, there were a lot more ponies during the meeting that we saw in "The Mysterious Mare-Do-Well" in Season 2.
- One smaller detail of this episode that particularly amazed me are the death traps Lightning Dust and her team flew through during their shows. We don't see a lot of sharp weapons in the show and considering this, I found myself very surprised that they put such deadly contraptions into an episode. This increased the darkness factor of the show a bit and it's always welcome to me when that happens!
- As well as more homosexual ponies! I loved that moment when Rolling Thunder winked at the mare in the audience and when this mare fainted over it. I love Lyra and Bon Bon, but seeing another lesbian mare in the show demonstrates that there are more homosexual ponies in Equestria, which increases the realism of the show greatly!
- We even got a little bit of interesting characterization for Spitfire! Not only was she very angry about Scootaloo preferring the Washouts over the Wonderbolts, the intimidating way in which she treated Scootaloo also shows that she isn't good with foals. This adds once more a great reference to the official comics, because it was in the Friends Forever issue with Spitfire and Rainbow Dash in 2014 where we learned that Spitfire is bad with foals.
COMIC CONTINUITY! :D
- This episode has appearances of the Student Six! During the shows of the Washouts, Silverstream and the others were sitting in the audience and following the show!
- Finally, it surprised me to find out that Equestria has liquid-fueled rockets. We've seen a bit of technology in Equestria in the past, but never something so developed. Is Equestria's technological level higher than we thought or has it simply advanced lately? Or, did these rockets even come from Equestria?
I have theorized about a nation on Equus that has a higher technological level than Equestria a few times in the past, so maybe such a nation exists and these rockets have been imported by Lightning Dust?
This episode is one of the best episodes of Season 8 and even of the whole show. It was amazing to see Lightning Dust making such an unexpected return into the show, when I did not reckon with it that we would ever see her again, and it is even more amazing to get such a wonderful episode with Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash. It's another outstanding episode just after last week's and, even though we're in Season 8 now, MLP: FiM has progressed and developed a lot with this episode and gotten even better than it was before.
See you next week!
This episode managed to beat out "Parental Glideance" as my favorite Rainbow Dash centric episode, it's that good.
I was happy to see LIghting back and very relieved that Scoots didn't get hurt.
4933853
Me too. My heart stopped when I saw her performing that stunt (against her will even) and flying over the burning wagons. If Rainbow Dash wouldn't have been there, she would be dead now.
This occasion marks also that I am completely sick of Lightning Dust now. After she almost killed Rainbow Dash's friends, I already didn't like her for obvious reasons, but was thinking that she can learn from this and if she would have done so, I would have given her a chance.
When she then made a pact with Radiant Hope to help her bring back King Sombra and getting him back on the throne of the Crystal Empire, because Radiant Hope promised her that she can get revenge on Rainbow Dash with this, I realized how evil she actually is and lost my belief that she can become better, because she was willing to endanger all of Equestria for getting revenge on her own enemy.
And now, after what she did with Scootaloo..... I am done with her. This is something I won't forgive her.
4933933
Agreed. If Rainbow hadn't been here, she would have been lucky if she survived this in the hospital. But FRankly, if LIghting would not be so rackless, I really could imagine she and Rainbow would be good friends.
4933760
The amount of drama in this episode is very high and this huge conflict between Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash makes it one of the deepest episodes of the show.
But I have to remind you that it isn't a Rainbow Dash centric episode, it is a Scootaloo and Rainbow Dash centric episode. Rainbow Dash isn't the sole mane character of this episode and Scootaloo was as much involved in the events as she was.
It's the first true Scootaloo & Rainbow Dash episode that we got since "Sleepless in Ponyville", one that actually focused on their relationship and their relationship only, unlike "Parental Glideance", which focused as much on the relationship between Rainbow Dash and her parents as it did on theirs, as well as focused on Rainbow Dash's past.
I am so happy we got to see these events.
4933936
If she would be a better person, then yes. Probably. But what Lightning Dust did now makes more clear that she is one of those who only care about themselves and who refuse to change than anything else could. Which is a rare sight in Equestria, but a few ponies are like this and Lightning Dust is one of them.
I hate her now, just as I hate Chrysalis for having tried to kill Applebloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle a few years ago. Just like Chrysalis, Lightning Dust is one of those who can't get redeemed, because they genuinely enjoy their bad ways, that's something I can see now.
I fear that, at some point in the future, Lightning Dust is going to do something that will have such horrible consequences for another pony, that she will get straight into prison for it. I just hope it isn't one of the ponies I care for the most..... This is another moment where I wish I could be in Equestria, to protect Applebloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle.
4933955
Me too. I would di what I can to keep them save, Dinky and any other foal included. By the way, what's your option on the leaks of the final Episiodse of Season 8. Me, I a bit confused.
4933957
None. I don't watch leaks and neither early releases, they just make the hiatus longer if you watch them. But let's take this to PMs, this will just get off-topic again here.